Imagine how much better they'd feel if they'd gone solar. A sun-powered installation with the same potential power output would set them back at least twice what they paid for their oversized whirligig. Most solar systems have a life expectancy of less than 20 years, which means they'll break even about the time the spent fuel rods from my home nuke are safe enough for the kids to play with.
I'm not saying alternative power has no place in Maine's energy mix. Some schools and businesses have installed such systems and made them pay, mostly because industrial-size solar panels and $700,000 geothermal drillings offer an economy of scale that individual units can't match. It's like the difference between my basement atomic power plant and the real thing.
But for the average homeowner or renter, installing even a tricked-out wood-pellet furnace for $15,000 makes no more fiscal sense than trading in the Prius for an Escalade. It's just engaging in the post-energy-crisis version of conspicuous consumption. You get to march to the poorhouse chanting, "My footprint is smaller than your footprint."
You want to cut your heating costs this winter? You could wait around for the government to do something, although this approach carries the danger of hypothermia arriving before the relief shows up.
Or you could . . .
Insulate. Weather-strip. Turn down the thermostat. Close off rooms you don't need. Use electric space-heaters in the ones you do. Put on an extra layer. Or three.
And remember, for the price of a single windmill, you can go to a New Hampshire liquor store and buy 1500 large bottles of Jameson Irish Whisky.
Toast me or roast me by e-mailingaldiamon@herniahill.net.
